


Six and Out

by facingthenorthwind (spacegandalf)



Category: Zombies Run!
Genre: Cricket, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-01-27
Updated: 2013-01-27
Packaged: 2017-11-27 02:56:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,052
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/657274
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/spacegandalf/pseuds/facingthenorthwind
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eugene doesn't understand how a nation could be so enthralled with a sport in which men in ridiculously white clothing stand around doing nothing for absurdly long periods of time.  Jack corrects him, with the assistance of what seems like every child in Abel under ten.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Six and Out

**Author's Note:**

> For the kinkmeme prompt: "Jack teaches Eugene how to play cricket. BONUS POINTS if they get the Abel township kids involved." It's exactly what it says on the tin.
> 
> This story involved some actual myth busting, in which I had to work out whether Eugene could in fact play cricket with one leg. The myth busting involved me recruiting my sister and us playing cricket with a roll of wrapping paper while standing on one leg. You can thank me later.

"You know, I'm fairly sure that my cricket career was over when I lost my leg," Eugene said as he watched Jack draw a line in the dirt with a garden stake. Jack had dragged him out to the rec yard so that he could 'teach him how to play the glorious game of cricket'. Eugene was unconvinced that it would be glorious, and equally unconvinced that he would learn anything.  
"Piffle!" Jack said as he finished the line, satisfied that it was straight enough for their purposes. "You're just making excuses. You don't have to run to play cricket."

"I was always under the impression that you had to score runs by running."

"Ah, but that's the beauty of it, 'Gene," Jack said, walking back over to him and picking up WG. "You can have runners to do that! If you like, I can run your runs for you."

"But that's cheating," Eugene said, frowning. They both knew that Jack could inform him that cricket was always played wearing three pairs of socks or the match was invalid, and Eugene would have no way to prove he was wrong.

"No, no, I mean in actual games -- if a batsman is injured so that he can't run but he can still bat, then he actually gets a runner who runs for him." Eugene was forced to accept that this was the truth, although he still had his doubts. Perhaps he could ask someone else -- everyone except Maxine was British, and the British were born with the innate ability to recite the rules of cricket, weren't they? "Now, hold this and I'll teach you how to bat."

"You know, the whole only-got-one-leg thing is real, and I'm not just saying it for fun. How do you expect me to bat with crutches?" Eugene used the bat for emphasis, swinging it around with one hand.

"Well..." Jack said, clearly just trying to buy time so he could work this out. "Umm... we could get a chair, and I'm sure you can bat without the crutches -- if you don't believe me, I'll bat standing on one leg, it'll be fine as long as we only use a tennis ball. And when you get tired, you can sit down. I'll need to teach you all the names of the fielding positions anyway."

This was going to be a long day.

***

Three hours later, Eugene had managed to hit the ball with the bat most of the time (well, _now_ he hit it most of the time) and Jack had made the executive decision that teaching Eugene to bowl was pointless, as he wouldn't manage it without a prosthetic leg. Eugene, for his part, was thankful that there was one less thing to learn, although he was beginning to enjoy cricket. A little. A tiny, tiny bit. Not enough to tell Jack.

The kids had been in some sort of class -- a parody of normality, this attempt at schooling they had going -- but now they poured out of somewhere into the rec yard, scuffing the lines Jack had drawn in chalk for the wicket.

"Cricket!" one of them yelled almost in Eugene's ear, jumping up and down. "Can I play? Pleeeeease," he said, looking from Eugene to Jack and back again. "I'm a really good batter."

"You ready to test out your skills in a real game, 'Gene?" said Jack, throwing the ball a few inches in the air and then catching it again with one hand. "I reckon you can take this lot. You can have this one on your team, if you like."

If things went really badly, Eugene reasoned, and he ended up losing to a bunch of ankle-biters, then he could probably plead a limb deficiency. "Sure," he said, gripping the bat a little harder. "What's your name, kid?"

"Max," the kid replied, giving him a grin that was missing several teeth.

Scarcely ten minutes later, they'd organised the teams. For the sake of convenience, Eugene's team was batting first, and Jack was the bowler for the first over. He had spent several minutes organising exactly where the kids stood around the yard, even though he knew that as soon as he threw the first ball, that would all be forgotten. It was the principle of the thing, really. Eugene had just been sitting down, resting his leg as he watched Jack illustrate whatever he was saying with wild arm gestures. At last, Jack turned back to face him from the other end of the wicket, and gestured for him to get up. "Come on, let's get this show on the road."

The first ball he hit gave his runner (a small, dark-haired girl who promised she was quick on her feet) enough time to get to the other end safely, as did the second, and the third. There was cheering every time she made it, and Eugene began to really enjoy it, properly, with a broad smile on his face as he settled into the rhythm of it. The fourth ball he got lucky and it went over the low fence into the vegetable patch, which Jack (rather proudly) proclaimed was six and out. For the captain of the other team, he was utterly failing to be anything but happy that Eugene's team had six more runs.

Eugene watched as the other kids bat -- some of them missed the ball and it knocked over their makeshift wickets, or came to rest against them with a 'thud'. When this happened, Jack said that you couldn't get out on your first ball (or, in some cases, on your second), and gave them another go. Given most of the kids seemed about three foot high, Eugene thought they did rather well, running from chalk line to chalk line, red-cheeked and grinning. The squeals of laughter began to attract a small audience of adults who didn't have anything pressing to do, and when it's time for Jack's team to bat, Ed Harrison asked if they could have a proper match later. Jack pretended to look scandalised, gasping loudly. "This _is_ a proper game!" he said, sounding offended, before continuing in a normal tone, "However, if you were to find yourself a team, I'm sure we could get the adults to show these kids how it's done."


End file.
